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bowl - brains and everything blown right out. I felt bad about that. The poor guy
never had much of a chance, but he was stupid. Then, the guy that thought his
buddy threw a grenade at him said, "I'll shoot that so-and-so." I said, "I can't hear
you." I didn't pay any attention. I heard some shooting going on. She wasn't there
anymore. They done her in on that account. He was shot with a BAR, one of our
own weapons the Japs had.
Anyway, the lieutenant, he goes in ahead; he was up further than the rest of the
platoon, far end; so he goes in by himself. In fact, I finally went up there, and there
he was. He got shot right down through the face. There was a rock there and a Jap
up on the rock and he comes in, looking, and nobody with him. If he had had
anybody with him, they'd have seen the guy there on the rock about six feet high.
Another thing, when we got to the end of the cliff, on one side of it, before we got
over to where he dropped that off, there was some brush on the corner of the cliff
and Sgt. Fry, one of the replacements came with Flesher and the lieutenant; he was
on up further and he was behind a rock, and he hollered "Hansen." No, he said,
"Sarge, there's some Jap soldiers in here." I rushed up there quick. I was 'Sarge' you
know. The lieutenant normally did, but he didn't happen to be right there, so I
looked in there and about that time here came the lieutenant; came running up
beside me, "What's going on, Sergeant?' I said, "There's a couple of Jap soldiers with
rifles in there, but" I said, "there's two women in there and a little kid like about two
years old sitting on a rock there." About that time one of the women took a rope
and put it around that kid's neck and choked him. The lieutenant went berserk; he
shot them all. He lost it - and they say about brutality, atrocities or something - that
wasn't his fault. He actually lost it. He couldn't take that: the woman killing that
little girl - looked like a girl. That's the cliff where the two soldiers, he didn't get
them, they were hiding in there; he shot the two women, but the two soldiers, they
jumped off the cliff - down that 500 foot drop. A lot of them did.
M: So they would kill their children or commit suicide, anything to keep from being
taken prisoner?
H: That's right. In fact, before that there was a cave and I had a corporal by the name
of Lawson. He and I were in this cave and there was a Jap in there, and a woman and
a little boy probably about five years old or six, and the Jap didn't have a rifle.
I talked to this Jap. "Betta Coy" (will not harm you). [Howard relates this by
showing how they held up the little book with the translation - 'Betta Coy' is the best
I can do with the Japanese words.] He could see that if I was going to harm him I'd
have shot him right there. I wouldn't lie. He had a wife and a kid and came at
Musson with a knife to stab him and of course, Musson .... I said, "Musson, don't
shoot him; back off', and Musson did so that Jap backed off and then he went and
grabbed that little kid and put his head over his knee and cut his throat. That's when
Musson shot him.
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There's one thing that always puzzled me. On Saipan up on that ridge where the
lieutenant told me not to take any prisoners; brush down in front; I was still sitting
with my cover over my hat waiting for action to go when one of my men down on my
right, course that was our front line, he heard a noise in the brush. The front and
to my left a little bit, so he brings his rifle up and I said, "Don't shoot. Don't shoot
till we see what we got." Here a man and a wife and a little boy came out and they
weren't Japs; they looked Samoan or something. Islanders of some kind. He was
scared to death and she was in awful pain. Her big toe on her foot had been split
right down the middle by a piece of shrapnel, and it was black. All swelled up and
black and gangrene - and that poor gal. Of course, the lieutenant starts speaking
Japanese to them. I said, "Lieutenant, they're not Japanese." I said, "Hey, Terrance"
he's Mexican, "Terrance, come on up here, quick", he came up, "try talking to these
people, will you, in your language." Boy, he jabbered away. I said, "Tell them we
won't harm them and that we'll take care of that bad foot." Boy! you talk about
relieved people! I said, "Tell them that we are going to take them down to our sick
bay, battalion aid, and get that taken care of." And I often wondered what happened
to that couple. Wonder if they're still on Saipan.
M: Were you taught some simple Japanese phrases to use?
H: No, just the little book. "Betta Coy" and I forget what others; we did know a few;
one of them says 'come on out, will not harm you', couple, three phrases. I don't
know if they were any good or not - the Japanese never paid any attention to them.
M: What did they think would happen if they were captured?
H: I have no idea. Anyhow, talking about taking prisoners: Even after I told them not
to, we were on Saipan about 100 yards at least from me, there were Marines moving.
There was a bomb-proof, steps going down into it, and I see these three Japs come
up out of there and lot of shooting going on. And the thing is, the first one had a
machine gun on his back - a light machine gun - and I screamed .... Marines right in
front telling them to come on out; talking to them; wasn't shooting. I screamed
"Watch outl!" and I couldn't shoot because if I'd have shot them I'd have killed two
or three Marines on the other side of them. I was in a hell of a predicament. That
front one dropped down...a guy that worked in the mess hall a lot; had tattoos all
over his body, took about six of them right in the stomach. I'm sure he never lived
out of that; doubt he ever did, but that's what happened if you tried to take
prisoners. Well, now we're about done on Saipan.
NOTE from "The Complete History of World War II"
"The island (Saipan) had fallen in twenty five days - over 25,000 Japanese were
killed. The Americans lost 2,359 in action, 11,481 wounded, and 1,213 missing.
Saipan was of such importance that Tokyo sent their Commander in Chief for the
Central Pacific ( the same man who commanded the forces that delivered the sneak
attack on Pearl Harbor) to lead
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